Right now Death Valley is at 90 degrees. The high pressure system might be gone by next week. But it might not be. So keep that in mind. 90 degrees with a sunny sky can be quite rough. Also, the road from Furnace Creek to Zabriski (wrong spelling) Point is closed. There is no access to a Zabriski point (by foot or by car) until construction work on the road is finished. Many roads are closed in Death Valley now. Go to the NPS DV website for a daily update.

Even north of Lee Vining the scenery is big. Bridgeport area is very nice. East of US395 near Bridgeport is Bodie. A well preserved ghost town. You can drive right to it and walk in. In winter, I don't know how well the road (dirt part of the way) is maintained. Bodie with snow is very interesting.

If you take Rt50 west, you will pass through South Lake Tahoe. If you go north from there (to I80), you will drive along Lake Tahoe on the right and the mountains on the left. This area abounds with ski areas and towns, with easy access to coffee and sticky stuff for breakfast.

The road to South Lake is probably open to Alpine(?) and closed beyond there. The Sportsman in Lone Pine serves up pretty good food.

The Alabama Hills near Big Pine and the eastern Sierra escarpment (with Mt. Whitney) are good photo ops, especially in the morning. As Lisa said, it is a wall. A long lens might be useful. Sunsets are spotty - great if you get one, hohum otherwise.

Later in the spring, a horse trip from Red's Meadow near Mamouth is really fine. One year, I rode through wild flowers up to my knees on horseback. A full days trip can take you to Thousand Island Lake in Yosemite and back.

With two under two, you may not want to get far from the car. The unpaved raod from Ubehebe to US395 (Big Pine area) is nice, but I would check its condition before trying. Other wise, I would head for US395 via Emigrent Wash. US395 norht is interesting as it goes up the Owens Valley and follows the Sierra. Roads across the mountains will be closed for snow about up the Rt50. The area west of Tahoe to about Placerville will probably have some flowers.

While it is getting warm in Death Valley, north of there can get very cold. Bodie is just plain cold and usually windy in winter.

395 from the south end of the Sierras up to Lee Vining is one of the most scenic drives in the world, IMO. I don't know how high the road up White Mountain (a longish side spur from 395 somewhere near Bishop) is open this time of year, but if you can get a ways up there it has an amazing view looking back at the east wall of the Sierras (and it really is a WALL from there). There are a number of side roads that lead way up into the Sierras from the 395 too; probably the best one, if it's open (again, I'm not sure what's open this time of year) is highway 168 out of Bishop heading to South Lake & Lake Sabrina. Check with the highway patrol first to see if it's open, though.